New job offer, but questions about job role

Hello TE, I've been lurking on this forums for a few months and learned tons of information on what I should do in the IT career field. I currently work as a jr. analyst for a small IT security auditing company doing mostly reviewing findings from interviews other analyst complete and writing system security plans and plan of action milestones.

Been here for about a two years now and while I was lucky to find this position coming straight from the help desk, I don't want to focus on writing as an all day job. So I've been looking at system administrator openings because the MCSA topics interest me

The job offer is for a Windows system administrator position which involves taking tier 2 tickets such as software installs, pc refresh, hardware ect. But the position also involves some WSUS monitoring and patching for workstations on the network as well as securing tap back ups for the servers. The benefits are that it pays about 5K more than my current role and gives me the title. It's for a government contractotor and it seems like most people there stay in thier positions for years, so it's unlikely I will be able to move up or over to Linux admin if I wanted to.

To me it sounds like a high level desktop support position and I'm on the fence because I don't want to move back in that direction (it was my previous role before the jr. analyst role). Any advise from the more experienced TE members here? Should I continue interviewing and hold out or take it anyway?

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Comments

Krones

This is tough. A lot of what you list does honestly sound liked high-level helpdesk / junior level tasks but do you know anything about the environment? What opportunity will the environment provide to you in order to help improve it. Will it afford you the time to perhaps learn powershell - and the backup experience can be very useful. A sys administrator that doesn't know backups is pretty much a fraud. What I'm trying to say, it's going to be what you put into it - and if the environment is open for some change than it's a better opportunity than your current one if you want to move into a system's administration role. Titles, degrees, certifications don't mean much for a lot of companies. At the end of the day it's about what you can do and your ability to adapt.

However, if you want to move into Linux administration - I would try to look for a different opportunity, finish the LPIC as a baseline and see if you can find a junior system's admin role for the experience.

Take a look at: Careers in Operations — Ops School Curriculum 0.1 documentation

GGrill

Thanks for the advise and article Kronos, I'm still reading the site now and it has some useful advise for somebody relatively new to IT like me. The environment is a small federal government building with Linux and Windows servers. The environment is composed of Linux servers mostly and a few Windows servers on this site.

Most of the Linux and Windows administrator's have been on site for 6+ years so I don't see much opportunity to move up or around anywhere unless I get lucky a few years down the road and get in the government. I like both Microsoft and Linux OS's but when doing my research on indeed it seems that Linux admins make more money than Windows admins. I guess I could study the MCSA to get into the field and then go for the LPIC, or the other way around.

tprice5

Krones wrote: »

A sys administrator that doesn't know backups is pretty much a fraud.

That's a pretty bold statement.

BradleyHU

did you get an offer letter, or is this a role that was presented to you to go interview for?

GGrill

I just got an offer for the position today, considering taking it but I still "hate" the idea of doing some desktop support.

GGrill

To update, the contract starts at the end of this month. Here is the job description..does this sound a like a good system administration opportunity or more of a high level help desk role? Another benefit is that is pays 10K more than my current role and they spoke about the "possibility" of moving the environment to a secret clearance requirement too. But.. I don't want to waste my time if I don't think I will learn anything to grow my knowledge.

Respond to user helpdesk requests and provide multiple tier level user support for resolving problems with computer hardware, software and network connection.

Perform system administration tasks such as Active Directory administration, file restorations, hardware support, software support and network infrastructure support

Deploy critical software upgrades, Microsoft security patches

Image and prepare computer systems for deployment to users

Maintain and support the PKI infrastructure and Common Access Card

Installs new software releases, system upgrades, evaluates and installs patches Performs system backups and recovery of systems

Maintains data files and monitors system configuration to ensure data integrity.

TomkoTech

This sounds like a helpdesk position to me.

Shdwmage

TomkoTech wrote: »

This sounds like a helpdesk position to me.

I have to concur with the above statement.

Gorby

To me it sounds like a help desk role since you will be involved with user tickets. There are some system administrator responsibilities I guess with the involvement with storage back ups and patching workstations if your using WSUS.

GGrill

Thanks, I'm going to lull it over tonight but I am leaning towards passing on the opportunity. I guess its system administrator in name only...when I interviewed they considered this role a mid level systems role.

joelsfood

I would ask for more information on the clearance before you make a decision. A secret clearance will get you in a lot of doors. I know mine did.

cyberguypr

I concur. The potential problem is that sometimes they reel you in with the promise of "some helpdesk tasks, future sysadmin" but you get stuck with helpdesk stuff for a long time.

GGrill

Good point, I will ask about the clearance details when I speak with them tomorrow. I would get to create AD accounts, push updates through SCCM and store back ups but it seems that at least half of my job would be user laptop/desktop related issues though, which can be a turn off. What are some responsibilities should I look for in a System Admin role in the future?

joelsfood

It really depends on the role, and the larger the systems department, the more specialized it can be. Day to day at my job can include any of the following, but also includes managing our ticket queue weeks I'm on call, which is mostly granting permissions to shares, creating new privileged accounts (Regular user account creation is automated), etc

Building and maintaining Vmware environment (New VMs, adding new hosts, building new clusters)
Deployment of new physical servers (UCS Blade servers, preferably, or Dell Rack servers)
DHCP server management (that's being phased to an appliance)
Create and apply SCCM deployments to install monthly patches
Security remediation of various settings, particularly on any servers in DMZ

Sr STorage guy and I get these added to our list
Creation and expansion of luns
Zoning of new storage and servers
Troubleshooting disk speed issues

SCCM guy handles
Building and maintaining system images for OSD
Building patch packages each month in SCCM (Then server guys deploy them)
Testing and creation of new OS images as new OS's come out
Testing and creation of new OS images as new hardware is adopted
Etc

Levithan

Sounds like a step backward, rather than a step forward. If you are looking to get more into the linux side of things, id think getting a LPIC or RHCSA cert would open alot of doors for you, considering your background. Good luck on your decision!